One of the big hypes of Windows 7 was the new integrated touch and multitouch features unheard of in previous systems. On paper, it all looks nice, but the folks over at Engadget recently tested out these said features of the beta on an HP TouchSmart PC, and were underwhelmed by the efficiency of the features.

Doesn't beta imply feature-complete? If Windows 7 is truly a beta then shouldn't the underwhelming experience of its features mean something? If not I guess Windows 7 isn't ready to be called beta and we'll once again be sold an incomplete and buggy OS as release quality.

I think you're confusing "beta" with "release candidate." An RC is supposed to be feature complete, the purpose of the rc being to iron out any major issues that might still exist. A beta, on the other hand, typically isn't feature complete and is a work in progress in both areas, features and bug squashing.

That argument may apply to performance or crashiness of a feature, but in general the UI or functionality of the feature should be ready by the Beta build (at least based on the way the Win7 project is being run). Multitouch suffers from a bit of a chicken-and-egg problem. It needs to be in the OS for apps to take advantage of it, but it may be a little while (and perhaps another version of Windows) before it's totally natural.